Reflecting on “Experimenting with Humans and Animals”

This lecture is part of the Research Ethics Grand Rounds. Anita Guerrini, PhD, is Horning Professor in the Humanities and Professor of History at Oregon State University. Her books include Experimenting with Humans and Animals: From Galen to Animal Rights (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003) and The Courtiers’ Anatomists: Animals and Humans in Louis XIV’s Paris (University of Chicago Press, 2015). Current research projects concern skeletons as scientific and historical objects (for which she recently won a grant from the National Science Foundation), and the role of history in present-day ecological restoration.

Looking at human and animal experimentation together revealed intersections and differences that were not immediately evident. This talk will look at some of the changes in policy, science, and public perceptions since Experimenting with Humans and Animals appeared at the beginning of this century, and how the landscape of experimentation has also changed.